Norman Mailer Wanted to Be Cancelled
Tomiwa Owolade's UnHerd essay reading 'The White Negro,' the stabbing, and The Prisoner of Sex against the Random House cancellation, arguing obscenity was Mailer's weapon. An about-Mailer clipping.
Tomiwa Owolade. “Norman Mailer Wanted to Be Cancelled.” UnHerd, 6 January 2022. https://unherd.com/2022/01/norman-mailer-cant-be-cancelled/
Owolade reads “The White Negro”, the 1960 stabbing, The Prisoner of Sex, and the Town Hall debate, casting Mailer as a “satyr” for whom naked obscenity was the weapon — and argues that indifference, not outrage, is the only thing that could truly cancel him.